Guinevere
by La Reine Noire
Summary: The wind whipped through his bright hair, just as Margaret's fingers had on the day they first met. Her own serpent in that garden in Anjou, promising all the world in a smile that set her heart pounding like the drums that called her father to war.


Title:

Ladies in romances were never seasick. They were ill from love or lack of love, swooning in the arms of their knights or dying beside their lifeless forms. But Margaret, like it or not, found herself bent near double over the ship's railing, spewing the contents of her stomach into the roiling water.

Behind her, she could hear Suffolk stifling his laughter and lashed out at him with one foot. It connected satisfyingly with his shin. In response, he moved closer, hand skimming her hips as he bent to her ear. "I hadn't expected this."

"You will not laugh at me, Suffolk," she hissed, wounded pride and nausea prompting her to thrust him aside. "Remember, I am your Queen."

"You are my lady," he replied, eyes lowered and unreadable. "The lady of my heart. As you know already."

"Your wife might object," said Margaret tartly. The Countess was safely ensconced in the cabin she shared with Margaret. _She_ suffered no seasickness; in fact, she was sleeping soundly. But Margaret was Queen. She could demand Suffolk's heart on a platter if it pleased her. At the moment, it rather did. "How much farther?"

"A few more hours, perhaps." From the corner of her eye, she could see him searching the horizon. The wind whipped through his bright hair, just as Margaret's fingers had on the day they first met. Her own serpent in that garden in Anjou, promising all the world in a smile that set her heart pounding like the drums that called her father to war. A war she had ended with her marriage to King Henry.

That knowledge had made the ceremony in Tours almost unbearable as she spoke her vows to Suffolk, drinking him with her eyes. She knew nothing of Henry save what few morsels she had gleaned from the cortège. Young and healthy, devout, with little interest in jousts and tournaments. His kingdom had been ruled for him all these years by his uncles Gloucester and Bedford--the latter dead before the walls of Rouen not so very long ago. This much Suffolk had told her, bitterness in the words.

"But you will change that, my lady," he added with a secretive smile. "No man alive could resist you, least of all my king."

Much as it galled her to admit it, Suffolk was right. King Henry--Sainte Mère de Dieu, how young he looked!--was practically twitching from excitement. The older, heavyset man in wine-coloured velvet had to be Gloucester, and the glare he shot Suffolk confirmed that. He had warned her of Gloucester's disapproval, the contempt he had for her father. As if he were any better, she had scoffed. Everyone in Paris had roared with laughter at his constant wrangling with the Bishop of Winchester, his futile attempts to turn the Earl of Armagnac against the French crown.

Well and so. He was an old man, past his prime. And she would have the king's ear. As she sank to her knees before him, Margaret studied Henry of Lancaster's face through lowered lashes, a slow smile tugging at her lips. She could almost hear his breath quicken, though the expression that flickered across his face was one of...fear? Margaret blinked, forced herself not to frown. She could hear Suffolk's voice beside her, though she had no thought for what he was saying. When she glanced back at the King, he was smiling again. She must have imagined that moment. After all, she had been travelling for some time.

Henry raised her slowly to her feet, as though she were a glass figurine. Then, with no warning, he flung his arms around her, spinning her across the floor with childish abandon. Laughing, Margaret clung to him. No, she had simply been imagining things. Henry was a man like any other. Even her own words barely registered, tripping in an unfamiliar tongue. His smile was gentle. Suffolk's, as she caught his eye over the King's shoulder, was murderous.

But even so he knelt with the others at the King's command. Something unfamiliar coursed through Margaret's veins as she gazed over the hall filled with men who knelt to her. They were all hers, to do with as she pleased. Placing her hand in Henry's, she let him lead her away, the sensation of Suffolk's eyes on her troubling her not at all.

Being queen, however, was somewhat less straightforward than Margaret had anticipated. It did not strike her until well after the coronation, the first time she set eyes on the Duchess of Gloucester. The Lady Eleanor had not been part of her retinue, as her marriage, however long-lasting, remained a source of some scandal. One of Margaret's ladies-in-waiting had told her the story, complete with rumours of a pact with the Devil made to snare the Duke's heart.

"There will always be stories," Margaret laughed in response. "They say the House of Anjou is descended from the Devil's daughter." She wondered if word of that would reach the Duchess, and rather hoped it did. _Pride goeth before a fall, my lady of Gloucester. Try as you might, you are no queen_.

Though she did pretend to it, and gloriously so. There were no whispers, no hidden smiles as she swept past. No pointed glances at her still-slender waist, though all the world knew she had never given Gloucester an heir and was surely far too old to bear a child now.

Not that Margaret was faring much better in that particular game. That Henry adored her, she had no doubt; that he desired her was equally obvious. And yet there was furtiveness in his touch, a sense of glancing over his shoulder, terrified that someone might discover that he loved his own wife. She knew he went to confession every time he left her bed, had longed to demand why he repented of the act that should give him his heir. But she swallowed the words instead, let them fester till the very sight of her husband and the too-solicitous enquiries from the court made her want to tear her hair in frustration. How else was she to get a child?

"My lady?" The voice she would have known anywhere, setting sparks tingling on her skin. "You sent for me."

"Yes, Suffolk, I did." She had avoided him these past weeks, the memory of what had transpired in Anjou too strong to intrude into a new and fragile marriage. But he had not forgotten; the force of his gaze attested to that. Margaret's fingers tightened on the arm of the throne as she finally looked at him. "What would you have of me, my lord Duke?"

"I would serve you," he replied, his face giving away nothing. "You know there are those who would have you sent back to France."

"Let them stew," Margaret said with a shrug. "The marriage cannot be undone." If she heard regret in her own voice, she refused to think about it. "It is my lord Protector, isn't it?"

"Gloucester," he held up one hand, counting on his fingers, "York, Salisbury, Warwick. You have the Cardinal if only for antagonising Gloucester, but I shouldn't count on him. He would sell his mother for promotion."

"And Warwick is no more than an arrogant peacock. Which leaves three." She had not thought about York or Salisbury. The former had been the English Regent in France, she vaguely recalled from her father's diatribes on the subject. He had cold eyes and lines of discontent etched into his face. And he was ambitious; Margaret of all people knew that hunger when she saw it. Yes, York was dangerous.

As if to echo her thoughts, Suffolk added, "You mustn't discount Salisbury either. He is slow to action, but where he leads, many will follow him."

"And they support Gloucester."

"For the moment." She could hear the smile in his voice. "As long as it serves their purposes, they support him. This is the court, my lady. We're all out to stab one another in the back."

"Even you, Suffolk?" Her voice was light, but she knew the gaze she directed at him was anything but. "Will you stab me if it suits your purposes?"

"Not you. Anybody but you." Unbidden, he rose from his knees. They were alone in the throne room, the King having gone to Mass at Westminster with his lords. Margaret had pleaded illness instead, but she hadn't expected Suffolk to stay. "I am your parfit gentil knight, my lady. You know that."

And just like that the rules changed. She wondered if that had been his plan all along, to use his warnings to slip through her guard. _Parfit gentil knight_. He had worn her favour, a scarf she had embroidered with her namesake, and won tournaments for her. He had worshipped her with his eyes. What had Henry done?

But that was unfair, surely. Henry, for all his faults, was her husband. It was high treason for a queen to betray a king. Suffolk's hand trapped hers on the throne. "This is not knightly, my lord."

"Lancelot was no less a knight than the others. In fact, they called him the greatest of all." Those last words slurred against her lips. Margaret could have stopped him--she ought to have stopped him--but instead she pulled him closer, ignoring the carved wood pressing into her spine.

"Not a fortuitous comparison," she finally murmured, biting back a bitter smile. "His love destroyed Arthur's kingdom. You would not wish that on His Majesty."

"He is no Arthur. His kingdom rots from within and will until we are rid of Gloucester. So," Suffolk trailed kisses to her ear, "what does it matter?"

Margaret opened her mouth to reply, but instead shoved him hard so he staggered backward off the dais as footsteps sounded outside the throne room. She could feel her knees shaking as she sank onto the cushion. But it was not the king who entered. York's eyes, icy and unnerving, seemed to look straight through her. "Your Highness," he said, kneeling.

"My lord Duke." She swallowed. "Were you looking for His Majesty? I believe he is still at Mass."

"So it would seem." There was a suggestion of a smile and not a reassuring one. "Forgive me for...interrupting. I'll wait elsewhere."

Margaret did not dare look at Suffolk until York had closed the door behind him, and even then she kept her eyes trained on the floor. "You fool. Have you any idea what would have happened if he'd seen...?" Her heart was still pounding, fingers clutching the arms of the throne to keep from shaking.

Suffolk laughed. "He saw nothing. And even if he suspects, he has no proof."

There were many things Margaret could have said to that, but the unsettling memory of York's eyes forestalled her. Instead, she rose and swept past Suffolk to the door. He caught her arm. "Tonight. The garden."

She did not answer, only disentangled herself and let the door swing shut behind her. That night she watched unseen from the parapet as he waited for nearly two hours, pacing back and forth. She knew his movements, his expressions, so very well, and as he was reaching the peak of his frustration, she descended through the corridors and stairwells and pushed open the garden gate.

"A penance, my lady?" he snapped.

Margaret smiled. "Had it been a penance, Suffolk, it would have been far worse. But the reward is a queen's heart."

She was sure the Duchess of Gloucester suspected. After all, that lady had done much the same thing many years before. But Margaret merely voiced her complaints about Eleanor Cobham's pride and Suffolk, in return, confessed the plan he had already set in motion--_myself have limed a bush for her_--to catch the haughty Duchess in a net from which even her powerful husband could not extricate her. And a useful little morsel to rid herself of York as well. Another one who sought the crown? That Henry should surround himself with such vipers was unconscionable.

Both Gloucesters and York, all swept aside. It was so easy--almost too easy, some part of Margaret's mind cautioned. But she ignored it, revelling instead in the prospect of triumph and in her lover's continued favour. The peers could frown all they liked now, trading whispers behind her back. Henry would never listen to them.

So she stood and watched as the Cardinal baited his enemy, as Suffolk jeered, and Henry did nothing. Her poor, hapless husband. Perhaps she did love him a little, as one might love a puppy or kitten, for his earnest efforts. Certainly she intended to protect him as he refused to protect himself. And as Eleanor of Gloucester plunged Lucifer-like and reeking of brimstone, dragging her husband with her, Margaret bided her time before volunteering the well-known fact that surely Henry was old enough to rule for himself.

She could feel Suffolk's grin as she spoke, and his fingers twined boldly through hers even as she stood beside Henry to humour York's ridiculous attempts to clear his name. _Now is Henry king and Margaret queen_. The crown, each time she caught her reflection in the pier glass, seemed to sparkle all the brighter.

She did not remove it when she went to Suffolk that night. For the first time, he spoke of Gloucester's death. A more permanent removal. The King, after all, was easily led, and loved his uncle far more than was advisable. Margaret wondered aloud if the Cardinal had suggested the idea in the first place.

"You can't trust him. We both know that."

"Trust Beaufort? I would sooner trust a snake. But he's useful. And everybody knows Gloucester is an ill-luck dukedom."

Margaret, as it happened, did not know about that. It was Henry who, albeit in puzzlement, told her about True Thomas of Woodstock and his untimely death at the hands of Richard the Second's favourites. But Henry's grandfather had had his vengeance, and Margaret could not suppress a shudder when he told her what happened to the favourites.

"That was different," she said. "You, my lord, are hardly Richard the Second."

"He's my uncle, Margaret." Henry's eyes were shadowed. "He has always protected me. I can't believe any less of him."

Mild-mannered her husband might be, but that was when Margaret realised he was equally stubborn where he chose to be. Regrettably, those choices were often poor. He called Gloucester to a parliament in Bury, no doubt intending to forgive him.

The night before Gloucester was due to appear before the court, Margaret dreamed of Camelot. The castle stood in weed-bedecked ruins and ghosts still played out battles on the empty walls.

She ought to have known. Later, much later, as she cradled what was left of her Lancelot and draped herself in black for her doomed lover--_ungentle queen to plead for gentle Suffolk_--she remembered that ladies in romances rarely ended well.

**NB:** Originally written for the a href"community./shaksperrandom/42081.html"Post-RSC Histories Ficathon and Lovefest/a. As it is based on Shakespeare's _Henry VI_, it is not historically accurate. Many thanks to Rosamund for an early beta, and to Angevin2 for organising the ficathon!


End file.
